xvi, 299 pages : 23 cm

Includes bibliographical references (pages 279-285) and index

1. Introduction -- Significance of the period -- Method -- One Judaism or many? -- Sources -- Dominant trends and issues -- Summary -- 2. The biblical heritage -- Historical sketch -- A historiography of civilization -- Revelation and law -- Sacrifice and priesthood -- Prophecy -- Wisdom literature -- Summary -- 3. Judaism in the Persian period -- Historical and archaeological background -- Political affairs -- The Second Temple -- The Samaritan schism -- Midrash and the foundations of Jewish law -- The literature of the period -- The canonization of the Hebrew scriptures -- Summary -- 4. The Hellenistic age -- Hellenism as a cultural phenomenon -- Under Ptolemies and Seleucids -- The Jerusalem Temple and priesthood -- The Gerousia -- Hellenistic trends in Palestinian Judaism -- Hellenistic reform and the Maccabean revolt -- Summary -- 5. Judaism in the Hellenistic diaspora -- The early history of Babylonian Jewry -- Jews in the Hellenistic world -- Political, social, and economic developments -- Religious life -- Anti-Semitism in the Hellenistic world -- The literature of the Hellenistic diaspora -- Summary

6. Sectarianism in the Second Commonwealth -- The Hasmonean Dynasty -- Pharisees and Sadducees -- Apocalyptics and ascetics -- Summary -- 7. Apocrypha, pseudepigrapha, and the Dead Sea Scrolls -- The Apocrypha -- Pseudepigrapha -- Dead Sea Scrolls -- Summary -- 8. The Jewish-Christian schism -- Judea under Roman rule -- Herodian rule -- Judea under the procurators -- The rise of the early church -- Parting of the ways -- Jewish-Christian relations in the early centuries -- Summary -- 9. Revolt and restoration -- The great revolt -- Destruction and its aftermath -- From temple to synagogue -- Restoration of autonomy: The authority of the rabbis -- Josephus: Historian of the great revolt -- The Bar Kokhba Revolt -- Rebuilding for the future -- Summary -- 10. Mishnah: The new scripture -- From Pharisees to rabbis -- Written and oral Torah -- The Tannaitic academies -- Midrash and Mishnah -- Halakhah and Aggadah -- The redaction of the Mishnah -- Other Tannaitic texts -- Summary -- 11. Formative Judaism comes of age -- Decline of Hellenistic Judaism -- Under Byzantine Christianity -- By the rivers of Babylon -- Summary

12. The sea of the Talmud -- Amoraic schools -- From Amoraic interpretation to Talmudic texts -- The Palestinian Talmud -- The Babylonian Talmud -- The exegetical Midrashim -- Jewish liturgy -- Summary -- 13. The life of Torah -- The world of the Aggadah -- The daily life of the Jew -- Sanctuaries in time -- The sanctified table -- Marriage and the family -- Ritual purity and impurity -- Life-cycle -- Study in the service of God -- The mystic way -- Summary -- 14. Epilogue: The hegemony of the Babylonian Talmud

plus-circle Add Review

comment

Reviews